Do you take a lot of short trips in your vehicle? When I say short here I mean between 5 to 10 miles or under 15 minutes. You know, short hops here and there to the store, school, or work. You probably do, whether you realize it or not. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the average length of a car trip here in the States is just under 6 miles and less than 7% of trips are longer than 30 miles. That’s not a lot of miles, right? Just a few quick little jaunts here and there around town doesn’t seem too bad. Well, it might not be bad for you, the driver, but those short little trips could be doing more harm to your vehicle’s engine than you realize.
The harm that those seemingly harmless short trips can cause your engine ranges from mechanical damage and oil sludging to shortened battery life and increased carbon buildup. The cause, of course, all boils down to one thing — temperature, or lack thereof. See, it turns out that starting your car cold all the time and not running it up to full operating temperature can have some pretty bad effects on your engine.
It’s All About The Temperature
Every vehicle engine out there is designed to work best in a narrow range of temperature. This range varies, but typically runs between 195 and 220 degrees Fahrenheit. It takes some time for your car or truck to get up to that temperature, longer than you might think, in fact. If you’re regularly taking short trips, your car’s engine will never get up to its proper operating temperature. When an engine doesn’t reach its proper operating temperature, that’s where the trouble starts.
The most serious problems caused by short trips are oil sludging and contamination. Through normal use, a vehicle’s engine gets water condensation inside of it as it heats and cools. That’s why sometimes your car will smoke a bit on startup or you’ll see some water dripping out of your tailpipe. If your engine doesn’t get up to the proper temperature, that water doesn’t cook off and stays inside the engine where it mixes with the oil. This can turn your oil into thick sludge, which clogs up oil passages and generally causes an awful, goopy mess…